Steve Poland

Guest Post on TechCrunch: Twitter And Facebook Turn Everyone Into An Affiliate Marketer

Steve Poland — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 22:01:42 +0000

You can read it, here. Enjoy!

http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/11/15/twitter-facebook-amazon-affiliate-marketing/

My Guest Post on Shoemoney: Gaming Google AdWords I did a guest post over on Shoemoney’s blog yesterday — “Gaming Google AdWords with Google redirects“....
IDEA #61 – Music Affiliate JavaScript Blog Include A simple script that anyone could grab and put in the HEAD of their blog/website (or install via a plugin for blogger/wordpress/typepad). Anytime there is an MP3 linked to on the page (and/or a band...
Guest Post on CenterNetworks: Google Introduces Physical World Hyperlinks to USA Guest post I wrote for CenterNetworks — reprinted below: Google has announced that 2D barcodes (called a “QR code“) can be included in their Google Print Ads program. Here’s how it works — you’re reading...
Twitter – Become the (Facebook) Platform, For Mobile I had an idea last week while chatting with Alex Payne, one of the Twitter developers. In the past, I wrote about how Twitter opened up their API for direct messages — which I thought...
IDEA #62 – Reincarnate Yub.com, but on Facebook You may not remember Yub, but Yub could have taken off like MySpace — it was an early Friendster competitor as well. They focused on shopping, MySpace focused on Music — and the Music focus...

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FourSquare API Ideas

Steve Poland — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 16:19:19 +0000

I haven’t looked at the API, but I see crazy potential of apps being built on-top of FourSquare. The one thing I REALLY WANT [and have for years], is, when I go to a restaurant.. I want to see what everyone that’s ever been there rates as the best dishes; then what my friends rate as the best dishes; then what I’ve had there in the past [I was at a Thai place the other day, where I've been a lot, but there's 100 menu items, literally. I have no clue that last dish I had, which was AMAZING].

I detailed this idea out awhile ago — I think someone could make it happen with FourSquare: http://blog.stevepoland.com/idea-76-the-greatest-menu-meals-fb-app-initially/

I’m in Buffalo, so I haven’t used FourSquare really at all, but I’d also love to see a “wall” for each bar/restaurant, where I could see everyone’s posts [within/at that bar/restaurant], or just my friend’s posts, or just my posts [w/replies of course]. It’d be another way for people to communicate and meet. If the music is way too loud, it could be said. If someone is puking in the 1st stall, it could be said. If a whif of reefer is going on, it could be said. If the blond in the red dress sitting at 7th seat at the bar is hot, it could be said.

I have some other ideas that I think could finally take off, if someone built them with FourSquare’s API…

This one is in regards to anyone at a sporting event, or concert, or happy hour, could post pics/videos from the event — and since everyone ‘checked in’ to foursquare is at same event, sending in a photo or video should be easy — something would check where you are, then it’d tag it for you without you worrying about it.

http://blog.stevepoland.com/idea-39-vyous-aggregated-event-photosvideos-everyones-views/

Actually, the following post is basically what FourSquare became [feb 2007 I wrote this]:

http://blog.stevepoland.com/idea-10-in-person-social-networking-eventbar-mingling-via-cell/

and

http://blog.stevepoland.com/idea-75-where-i-hang-out-facebook-app/

I detailed this idea out awhile ago — I think someone could make it happen with FourSquare: http://blog.stevepoland.com/idea-76-the-greatest-menu-meals-fb-app-initially/

I have some other ideas that I think could finally take off, if someone built them with FourSquare’s API…

http://blog.stevepoland.com/idea-39-vyous-aggregated-event-photosvideos-everyones-views/

Actually, the following post is basically what FourSquare became [feb 2007 I wrote this]:

http://blog.stevepoland.com/idea-10-in-person-social-networking-eventbar-mingling-via-cell/

and

http://blog.stevepoland.com/idea-75-where-i-hang-out-facebook-app/

Let me know if you build one of these — put it in the comments.

Updated: FourSquare opens their API a bit more.

My Favorite Ideas for Ringside Startup to Use These are some hand-picked ideas from my Techquila Shots vault that I think are the best and most practical (given the anticipated budget) for Ringside Startup. Please contribute to Ringside Startup if you’d like to...
ADVICE: Give Away Your Ideas & Take A Load Off Seth Godin has a post up about giving away ideas and how execution is the real hard part. It’s the truth. Personally, giving away ideas is like therapy for me — or rather, a necessity....
IDEA #76 – The Greatest Menu Meals (fb app initially) Submitting this to Startup Weekend NYC this weekend. The Idea: The Greatest Menu Meals (fb app initially) The Concept: Users rate specific meals on the menu of restaurants. We’d have menu’s for restaurants and users...
Which are my Best Ideas? I’m curious — what ideas that I’ve exposed do you like the best? Which ones do you feel are most practically poised for success? Post in the comments — please refer to the reference number...
All My Web Ideas, are all Yours I’ve made a decision — I’m not going to be holding ideas back on this blog. I’ve been marinating on a few that I think are quite great (look for them soon) — but I’m...

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Evaluating Startup Ideas

Steve Poland — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 12:44:46 +0000

Someone just asked me, I responded with the following in less than 2 minutes [possibly 1 minute]. What would you tell someone that asked how to evaluate his/her startup ideas?

Evaluating ideas — talk to people; tell them your idea; what problem does it solve. Great if it solves a problem you personally have — because then you know a need exists [if you didn't find a solution already in all your research]. Start small and ugly. Don’t go into debt — 1 in 100 ideas that are executed actually become something. [I made that number up, but it's close enough -- don't gamble everything you have; the idea is to get other people involved so you have less risk... if others put money up, or will buy your thing, or use it, then you know you have something]. Stick away from pitching friends — they’ll likely nod their head, think you’re crazy, but won’t tell you because they don’t want to hurt your feelings or burn out your enthusiasm/passion that you obviously have for whatever you’re pitching them.

Some New Ideas & Startup Weekend In Boulder this weekend, something cool is going down — Startup Weekend. 72 people are getting together this weekend (starting tonight 6pm) and going to create a business in 3 days. I’m excited for them...
Evaluating Criteria for your Web 2.0 Business Idea I’d like to start a discussion about evaluating your business ideas — and determining which one to run with and build a start-up out of. What criteria do you feel are important? How can each...
My Favorite Ideas for Ringside Startup to Use These are some hand-picked ideas from my Techquila Shots vault that I think are the best and most practical (given the anticipated budget) for Ringside Startup. Please contribute to Ringside Startup if you’d like to...
What Web Service/Software Startup Ideas do you have? Share. You know you don’t have all the time in the world. I’m sure you have some decent ideas that you’ll never run with, or lack practicality, or you lack the capability. Share ‘em and...
Web Startup Ideas – The List and The Drought I’ve published a ton of my web startup ideas in the past (see my Archive page and scroll through them), but have shown a bit of a drought here on my site. I still get...

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Best Live Concert I’ve Ever Been To: Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros

Steve Poland — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 17:43:16 +0000

This is saying a lot. If you know me, you know I likely have attended, on average, 2 concerts per month for the last 12 years of my life. Thus, nearly 300 concerts — that doesn’t really consider the nearly 50 acts that I see at various concert festivals (SXSW).

I’ve seen the new face of rock ‘n roll, and I was sober. This band lit up The Independent in San Francisco, CA, which is close to their homebase of Los Angeles.

I have described it as “happy hippie rock ‘n roll”.

I love these songs-
Home
Come In Please
Om Nashi Me

Ok I mean, those were the best damn songs played live.

I clapped with the crowd, intensely for 3 songs straight. I didn’t even feel any pain, and just kept clapping harder. And harder. Jumping in place. Couldn’t stop moving. Didn’t want it to end.

Expect lots of 2nd hand weed smoke. I want to become a groupie and follow them. The one chick’s vocals blow your mind considering how petite (and high on drugs) she is.

If you get a chance to see this band, you don’t even need to listen to the music beforehand — I assure you I had no clue what I was expecting, I just knew that my buddy Jonathan Strauss (of Awe.sm) had talked them up to me so much that when I was in SF earlier this month and he was, and he told me they were — I said, done, I’m in.

This band couldn’t be talked up enough — your expectations could be higher than a kite and they’ll still blow you away.

I just bought 4 tickets for their show in Toronto on November 24, 2009. Here’s their schedule and some songs to listen to.

Prepare to have the most fun you’ve ever known.

IDEA #98 – Live Music Concert Tracking I wrote this email to the founders of Tourfilter, but had never sent it. I’ve sent it now and thought I’d republish here. This was from a few months ago, so some of these may...
IDEA #59 – Music News and Concert Dates for your Favorite Bands This idea is essentially to create a central place you can go and have a completely personalized experience that keeps you informed on music news and concert dates for bands you like — and doesn’t...
IDEA #28 – Fan-submitted Music Video Ideas I’m obsessed with music and marketing, so some of my ideas will be around music — plus, deep down, I really want to be a rock star (who doesn’t). I was just watching the video...
IDEA #18 – Custom Music/Sports T-Shirts If you’re into music or concerts (particularly hard rock), you’ve been to Hot Topic. They sell tons of band “swag” (fancy term for shirts, etc). But how many of those shirts do I want? None...
IDEA: Plugin to Sync Listening of a Song with Friends I use iTunes when I listen to songs. My buddy listens using Winamp. We both have Last.fm and PC’s. We have similar music collections, if not same songs here and there. We like to instant...

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Any UX / UI / GUI / Graphic Designers out there?

Steve Poland — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 15:08:55 +0000

Specifically I’m seeking a contract UX designer — someone that can go through our app and make the usability better. As a quick task to see if you have the chops, how can you make the following ‘reports/stats’ page more usable? [This page basically breaks down stats for any plugin that the Publisher is using in their Extendy toolbar on their website].

If you are this UX someone, or know of someone, please drop me a quick note.

IDEA #84 – Reskin The Web I kind of like this idea. Imagine this — users install a plugin to their browser; then they can view various designs of a website. Other designers/users can post new designs of a website —...
IDEA #22 – Amazon.com Social Networking There must be a way to turn Amazon.com’s userbase into a huge social network. Amazon offers an API that gives access to their user reviews (although it may just be per product — so you...

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How to Startup! (not being a programmer)

Steve Poland — Tue, 05 May 2009 12:19:53 +0000

I gave this presentation last night at our third BarCampBuffalo. Sorry there’s no audio (or some examples of my pencil mockups, or RFP spreadsheet):

How To Startup!

View more presentations.

BarCamp Buffalo #3 (May 4, 2009 @ 6:30PM) We’re trying something a little different this time — we’re going to have a theme at this BarCamp, which this time around will be Social Media (anything related to blogging, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc). You...
Are you a Senior PHP/MySQL programmer? If you’re a great PHP/MySQL programmer (and looking for some potential side work; specifically tonight) — email me. Please don’t waste my time if you really aren’t that good. You can just email me, but...
Do you know a Web GUI Designer? I have various projects here and there that require someone that can take the pencil drawings I create for various pages, and turn them into actual designed webpages — just as a PSD file, I...
Programmer Sought: In-Text Links Script like Kontera I’m looking for an AJAX/PHP/MySQL programmer that can write a script similar to that of the following sites: Kontera, Miva InLine, OptSpots, or Yahoo Shortcuts. The script would be javascript that would go on the...
Startup Weekend Toronto – My Two Cents Overall the weekend was a blast — but not exactly what I expected. I had my own expectations of the weekend after hearing about the Boulder Startup Weekend. I had expectations of a lot of...

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Start-up Roadmap?

Steve Poland — Mon, 04 May 2009 19:40:51 +0000

I received a question from someone that I thought was a good one:

After doing some research and a lot of googling I´ve a lot of resources in
different areas (customer development, project managment, agile development,
business plans, etc). I feel frustrated trying to glue all this together in
a practical order so that I can feel I have a horizon (a road map) to start
with. Is there such a thing ?

I sent this out to a few people to see what recommendations they’d give. Brad Feld said “If there is, it’s useless. There’s not a roadmap for starting a company – just a zillion little pieces to put together in unique ways each time.”

I agree with that, but having some kind of outline to help you consider those zillion little pieces, would be good — even though not every start-up will have to consider the parts.

Dave McClure said, “I agree with Brad that every journey is unique, but there are probably a few places that can help speed you along the path. You might try http://startupcompanylawyer.com as one resource, http://venturehacks.com as another.

Fred & Brad’s blogs are also great places to start. Don’t know how much of the old Garage site is still around, but Guy Kawasaki’s blog might also have some useful refs.”

David Cohen of TechStars chimed in and recommended Guy’s book The Art of the Start, which is “one book that seems fairly timeless. This will at least give you a good list of things to think about. Obviously, it will never be comprehensive to a particular startup.”

Here’s a link to some presentations by Guy’s Garage.com for building a company.

Any other good resources? Please list them in the comments.

Thanks Brad, David, and Dave for the input.

Blogging a Web Start-Up with Expert Insight Ringside Startup has officially launched. Here are the basics on this endeavor: I’m raising $20,000 in reader/sponsor contributions to launch a web start-up. Contributor participation entitles you to vote on actual business decisions — the...
What’s your Life’s Roadmap? Had a quick email exchange with a friend — I liked the roadmap he rattled off quickly: 1) Make money anyway possible 2) Create something of value that makes money 3) Help others (in whatever...
10 Twitter Hack Start-Up Ideas 10 Twitter application ideas — with or without their API are below. Be sure to throw some Google AdSense around any of these ideas to get a little monetization out of your project. digg interface...
SHARE: Web Start-Up Idea Websites I drifted over to Techquila Shots reader Timothy Chen’s website, “Idea is Queen!” where he is writing out his ideas. What other websites do you read that are brainstorming web-based start-up ideas? Or (links for)...
START-UP SCARS: 10 Times I’ve Fallen On My Face As a child, you learn that if you touch the hot burner, you’ll get burned — and definitely mentally scarred, if not also physically scarred. The same is true in starting a business — most...

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100+ Web Start-up Business Ideas

Steve Poland — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 14:42:38 +0000

With this recession and unemployment so high, there’s likely a lot of people looking to start their own business. Hopefully one of these ideas of mine can provide some inspiration to just one of those people.

I’m formerly a TechCrunch writer, a serial web entrepreneur, and an idea guy. I can’t believe I’ve posted 100+ web start-up business ideas in the past couple years. Below is a compilation of them. They are all for the taking and if they aren’t perfect, hopefully they give you some ideas of your own. If you’ve seen any of these implemented, please post in the comments as I’d love to check them out. And if you know other ‘idea’ websites, please post in the comments for others to visit.

I’m currently working on my own start-up, InSeconds, which is launching a beta in early June 2009. If you have a website, you’re going to want InSeconds (I hope!). Be sure to sign-up your email address to be apart of the beta.

My other posts about start-ups, inspiration, etc, can be found here.

IDEA #28 – Fan-submitted Music Video Ideas I’m obsessed with music and marketing, so some of my ideas will be around music — plus, deep down, I really want to be a rock star (who doesn’t). I was just watching the video...
10 Twitter Hack Start-Up Ideas 10 Twitter application ideas — with or without their API are below. Be sure to throw some Google AdSense around any of these ideas to get a little monetization out of your project. digg interface...
IDEA #60 – Video Search from the Audio I’m assuming this has to be happening somewhere. Basically, there should be a video search engine that uses speech-to-text technology (which isn’t perfect, but even if it’s 90% right, that’s better than nothing) and starts...
IDEA #12 – E-Cards with Your Voice (and bonus ideas) E-Cards are over 10 years old and still in my opinion one of the most viral things on the web. When you receive an e-card, it’s instinct to send one back to that person —...
IDEA #9 Revisit: Online Videos Archived For Life Liz Gannes of NewTeeVee (GigaOM network) has a great article bringing up the fact that online video widgets (embeds from YouTube for example) have some short-comings — the video sometimes disappears (whether it be copyright...

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IDEA #100 – Twitter License Plate social network

Steve Poland — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 14:11:02 +0000

Can’t believe I have posted 100 ideas on this website now. As with any of them, they are all for the taking — I hope they bring you inspiration, or I hope it’s an idea that you’ll want to build! Let me know if you build any of them, I’d be excited to hear it!

It’s 8:45am and I was just leaving my friend’s house when I saw the parking sign that said “No Parking 9am-4pm on Mon, Tues, Wed”. It’s Wednesday. His car was parked on the wrong side. I shot him a text message and he switched to the other side of the street.

I’ve been in my car and seen tail-lights out while driving, or tires that are really low, or mufflers practically dragging, or wanting to offer sympathy to someone who’s car was obviously broken into, or someone that left their lights on in the parking lot, or a cop going down a line of cars that are parked illegally giving tickets (I wish I could warn those people!). I often try to get the attention of the people in the car, but typically it’s an utter FAIL. Sometimes I’ve seen single hotties in a car, wanting to know if they truly are single. Or I’ve seen people rocking out to a song and wanting to know what it is. Or I’ve seen a classic Mustang that I wanted to give props to.

There’s a solution that could happen to all these pains, if it were to be created and get visibility in the mainstream. There could be a Twitter service that someone builds, maybe with the ‘auto‘ twitter username (which Jason Calacanis happens to have reserved; I have ‘autos’).

I’d imagine that I could tweet “@auto NY:ABC-123 you need to move your car! you’re parked illegal, it’s Monday”. Anyone could follow ‘auto’ and they could specify which license plate numbers they want to be alerted of via direct message, with whatever was said. Each state, country, would need a proper syntax, but someone could figure that out. Here’s a list of ones in the USA.

This can then be extended to its own website domain — imagine Dogster, but for Autos. Each license plate will have its own webpage, people could send in photos as well (via twipic w/ “@auto NY:ABC-123″ in the subject, which will then get pulled into this webpage). People can post make, model, color — and even link actual people to the vehicle. [Monetize the site via some Google AdSense, or displaying similar cars that are for sale on eBay. Lots of money in auto advertising vertical.]

Obviously this could have a brutal side as well, of people bitching to each other about their driving skills.

Anyhow, even if some of my friends aren’t on Twitter or whatever, I could follow their license plates and be alerted via direct message if someone says something about them [and if it's important, I could forward to my friend].

Any other thoughts on this idea? Put them in the comments. Otherwise, who’s building this out? Go for it, I’ll be you first beta tester.

The Largest Social Network In World, Untapped I was at Web 2.0 Expo last month in San Fran and during a press interview sit-down session, Tim O’Reilly said something that was a “wow” moment for me — I just had never really...
IDEA #42 – Audio Ads Network Provider As many of you are aware, I have posted several ideas that utilize VXML technology. I write ideas that incorporate this technology, because I feel it’s under-utilized, has great utility (the phone is something everyone...
IDEA #36 – Social Audio / Video Recommendations Problem: I’m out and want to rent a movie, or buy a movie / CD / book — I’d like recommendations from friends or people with similar tastes as mine. Solution: Dial a phone number...
IDEA #88 – Rent Your Twitter Background & Avatar I’m going to put three(!) ideas in here that are quick. The Twitter API has now given access to your profile background image (update_profile_background_image), profile avatar (update_profile_image), and profile design colors (update_profile_colors). Apparently Ian Schafer...
IDEA #10 – In-Person Social Networking – Event/Bar Mingling via Cell Result/Solution proposed by this business idea: People will begin interacting with new people, making new friends in person. Some people will find dates or meet others that will end up being very good friends —...

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RE: The First Ten Things the New CEO of MySpace Should Do

Steve Poland — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 03:04:14 +0000

Response to Jason’s MySpace To-Do list:

I think #2 and #3 that I list below are most important. [I aligned them with your #'s].

#3 has the most upside [global to 1billion users].

#11 is an idea missing [they are slowly losing bands, and thus band followers, over to twitter].

1. Buying a search engine is overkill. You don’t care about the search engine, you care about the advertisers — Google has landed them (and due to the mass competition can get nearly 3x revenue what their next closest competitor gets Yahoo …. unless that number has changed) — so have a big emphasis on search, but use Google and take your 80% rev-share that you can negotiate [because Google doesn't want to give up those searches and put a competitor 'on the map']. A search engine isn’t their core competency.

2. There’s a reason MySpace is dead [or dying] — people are sick of the mess! It’s a clusterfuck of clutter! Geocities was the same way. Yahoo — same way [which is part of why Google took over Search]. I’d maybe think of introducing a “flip-side” of MySpace — a sexy, clean, cohesive version — and then the version where users can go buckwild-style on their pages [hell, bring back the 'blink' tag and let them go at it]. I think in order to take-over mobile, you need to clean up the mess first on the website.

3. Global efforts and race to 1billion users: Partner/buy global social networks that don’t overlap too much with your existing userbase. Also, need to internationalize the site [if it hasn't been already; FB has users doing this for them].

4. You’re talking a massive overall here (no more coldfusion? ahh!). But maybe it could be outsourced to the gods… http://www.pivotallabs.com/

5. Games: Fuckin’ bingo. No brainer; can’t believe this hasn’t been done yet. Oberon Media, they should go buy ‘em.

6. Love the virtual currency. This is still up for grabs; they could potentially shift into OWNING this space — and hell, MySpace Coins might make their way into Facebook App games if they were the most dominant virtual currency. [And that is, if the USA could grasp this concept]

10. Content sites: Agreed, but this is insignificant in the big pie they are tackling.

11. They use to OWN the bands, they still kind of do, but Twitter is hopping in there and grabbing a piece. Twitter owns the communication; MySpace owns their space. I’ve been watching ‘30 Seconds to Mars‘ and ‘Imogen Heap‘ on Twitter — both are in the studio working on new albums; it’s been exciting to watch their progress (and I’m in great anticipation for releases!). Anyhow, they need a “status update” service.

/end

IDEA #77 – Social Search Engine (take on Google) Another idea for NYC Startup Weekend this weekend… The Idea: Social Search Engine [take on Google!] (fb app / browser plugin / toolbar) The Concept: Take-on Google with a social search application. Users do a...
Facebook giving stock to Universal Music? Full length songs removed from Myspace for Universal Music artists – Ouch to MySpace. Very interesting — the only reason MySpace still really exists, is because every music artist is on it. As Universal retracts full songs from MySpace, that cripples MySpace a bit — and will get users...
My MySpace Days Are Over I’ll likely let my profile sit there, but those days are over. The only comments I get anymore are from my “friends”, but are really bots that have hacked my friends’ accounts, and have posted...
IDEA #52 – Search Revenues Benefit Charities gCharity is a search engine that apparently donates 90% of search revenue proceeds to a charity. The link was posted by Drew, a Techquila Shots reader, but doesn’t list what charities or how much revenue...
IDEA #4 – The MySpace Killer? Proximity Social Networking I have said in the past that if MySpace is v1.0 of social networking, then MyBlogLog is v2.0 of social networking. So what’s v3.0? It’s proximity (geolocation, “in-the-vicinity”) social networking. The software you’d be...

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